I’ve been writing a lot lately about BDR (backup and disaster recovery), and I’ve even been trying to keep my eye on where storage is trending. Based on some of my recent interviews with solid state vendors Nimbus Data Systems and WhipTail, it looks like the future of storage is heading toward solid state. (Coming soon, I’ll be interviewing Violin Memory, another solid state storage vendor to get their perspective on solid state storage’s play in the enterprise).
Up to this point, I’ve made the assumption that tape-based storage is dead. But a recent article I saw in my inbox, which started with the words “tape is not dead,” caught my attention. I was intrigued enough to download it to learn more about the author’s rationale. The quote comes from: “Common backup tape storage errors: TLC for your tape storage,” written by Alan Earls. Earls starts off the article quoting Steve Suesens, category manager at Staples Technology, who backs up his intriguing quote with, “As long as data continues to double every 12 to 24 months, tape will be around for a long time.” I was actually quite surprised by this reasoning because I’ve heard some MSPs and disk backup vendors saying the same thing to explain why tape is on its way to extinction. Suesens gives a second reason for tape’s viability: “Backup tape storage may have some reliability advantages over disk backup.”
Now, I’m really confused. I thought all the analysts are claiming that half of restores from tape don’t work, and when it does work, it takes a long time to restore. I’d like to hear from our storage VARs/integrators/MSPs. Has tape been receiving an undeserved bad rap? Does tape still have some advantages over disk and/or other media? If so, what are some examples you’ve seen in your business?
March 30, 2012 at 2:35 pm
Tape isn’t dead yet. All that stuff about tape being unreliable is BS, though like any form of media (including hard drives) you have to take care of your media. If an employee is taking a tape off-site, that employee needs to know not to leave the tape on the dashboard of their car in the middle of summer.
Where else can you get a terabyte (LTO4 plus a little compression) of storage for $20? The flooding in Thailand last year drove disk prices up, and that has extended the life of tape by at least another year.
Tape is on it’s way out. There are definite advantages to disk-based backups, as everyone knows. There aren’t many new tape installations going in, but existing installations are getting upgrades and maintenance wherever the ROI makes sense. Tape isn’t dead, but it’s semi-retired (it’s still working for existing customers, but not taking on new business.)
April 3, 2012 at 9:58 am
One of the topics I’m hearing more about from media vendors is ‘silent data corruption,’ which is what they’re labeling when a good backup becomes corrupt at some point between the time the backup occurs and when it’s retrieved for a restore. This topic hasn’t just been brought up bashing tape, but has been applied to disk-based backups as well. I’m curious as to how real of a problem this is and whether it’s more common among restores from tape compared with restores from disk.